I assume the full final version of texture pack will arrive if and only once the actual map finishes. Although the 'limited' version of the texture pack maybe distributed IF we ever decide to release a little part of map before the full map releases (probably not though).

Well, I hope you reconsider, I'm not a big adventure map player, but I love the look of your texture pack!

Well, I hope you reconsider, I'm not a big adventure map player, but I love the look of your texture pack!

Well, in the end, the texture pack is sorely created for the use in our map; not others. You should be free to make your map using our texture pack, but why don't you make your own version of texture pack for your own map? This is what other mapmakers (and I) mostly do. In fact, it should be better to make your version since you can claim the right to your own texture pack and you will be allowed to edit when there's something wrong or you feel disturbed. Even more, the textures are from the raw Half-Life files so as long as you have the extractor (which you can easily find in google) you will be able to very easily make pack out of thin air. I originally planned to use the infamous Juraj's Half-Life texture pack. But since it was outdated by like, 3 centuries so I had to make my own. This pack is created solely by us from the bottom of nothingness and believe me, I had no experience in making texture pack prior to this. And we've come this far! I'm certain that since you are more experienced in this, you'll be able to make much more nicer texture pack than us!

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"... Some people say, "How can you live without knowing?" I do not know what they mean. I always live without knowing. That is easy. How you get to know is what I want to know."

Well, in the end, the texture pack is sorely created for the use in our map; not others. You should be free to make your map using our texture pack, but why don't you make your own version of texture pack for your own map? This is what other mapmakers (and I) mostly do. In fact, it should be better to make your version since you can claim the right to your own texture pack and you will be allowed to edit when there's something wrong or you feel disturbed. Even more, the textures are from the raw Half-Life files so as long as you have the extractor (which you can easily find in google) you will be able to very easily make pack out of thin air. I originally planned to use the infamous Juraj's Half-Life texture pack. But since it was outdated by like, 3 centuries so I had to make my own. This pack is created solely by us from the bottom of nothingness and believe me, I had no experience in making texture pack prior to this. And we've come this far! I'm certain that since you are more experienced in this, you'll be able to make much more nicer texture pack than us!

I actually have no experience with texture packs, or map making. I'm just referring to random things that I like to build. Like right now I'm wanting to build a military complex, which would be perfect with your texture pack. If you don't want to release it, I understand. I barely have time to play minecraft, so I doubt I'll be making a texture pack any time soon.

The new Minecraft Forum layout have broken the original post. But we've taken care of it. So yeah... I believe we have fixed the OP. (at least for now) I can't believe they removed and tweaked so many useful feature. Like, pressing Enter to make a new paragraph and Shift+Enter to make a new line. Not the opposite!

Trailer aside, we've lost contact with one of the dev (Yeah, he's been offline for days now. Maybe he's dead...) and it is being delayed because of this.

So to apology, here's a new screenshot!

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"... Some people say, "How can you live without knowing?" I do not know what they mean. I always live without knowing. That is easy. How you get to know is what I want to know."

Wow, It has been quite a silent time again, hasn't it? Of course, shorter than the delay of the next Obsidian Conflict update, but still it was pretty long. (It's partially because we'd like to keep everything secret...) It was a nice progressive year despite all the slack offs we've been doing for a few months in-between! At least we've got to finish many parts of the map.

And to somewhat celebrate it, here is seven new screenshots, including some actual gameplay scenes! if you can call it a gameplay, that is

Now there are some good news and some bad news. The good news is that we are still alive and making additions to our projects, and I don't think our love of Half-Life will die in any time soon. Although Grand Theft Auto V has been grabbing our ankles lately... and Source SDK.

Can you find where the Houndeye is?

I've got a few letters asking me why I chose to work on Minecraft instead of Half-Life 1, or even 2. It's simple; there are already too many mods tributed sorely to Half-Life including the infamous Black Mesa for Half-Life engines.

On the other hand, most of Half-Life projects I saw on Minecraft Forums were obsolete, out-of-date files including the infamous Juraj's Half-Life texture pack. There weren't any adventure maps with Half-Life styles either. All of them were simply mimicking the original game in a mere eye-candy style.

Sometimes I get sad when I see yet another Portal-like escape map on this forum, but no Half-Life-like adventure map. Maybe this is what keeping me inside of this project. I must get this finished or Minecraft community will be flooded by GLaDOS's evil plan to take over the internet. (Now, no offense. I'm a huge Portal fan too. I even made a few maps and a mod based on Portal in Source SDK!)

Well, this is a bit out of topic, but I am also working on Half-Life maps on source engine too. I hope to finish it before Christmas 2015.

Anyway, let's get back to the bad news. The next year, 2015, may be a hard time for our team. (not will, but may) It's not strictly confirmed yet, but there is possibility that one of our dev will soon have to leave our team due to a force beyond our power. In addition to this, our school time will become much longer than now, forcing us to stay at school longer, and therefore less time to make physical additions to our map.

Even if this happens, it won't mean we'll completely stop working on the project. It simply means that there will be less time put into work. I'm assuming of at least 50% decrease, but that should be all. We still will be constantly working on the media releases, resource packs, and of course, the map making itself.

Still, in order to somewhat counteract this (if it ever happens!), we've come up with a plan... It's not a brilliant one, but still a plan. Keep reading first!

Aww, I have to go?

We are glad to share the first media release thatactuallyshows the gameplay. The simplified square health/hunger bar was actually a temporal placeholder, but it looked as if it will do its job pretty well for us so we left it. What do you guys think?

And yes, the pistol/combat knife/pipe wench textures were directly imported from the Half-Life/Opposing Force file. (The pistol's texture is expected to be replaced by higher quality image soon.) But you may have noticed we've drawn crowbar's texture ourselves rather than importing it. This was because we've found a major problem with the Half-Life crowbar model... You'll know it if you were to see it!

Just for your information, their strength comparison is as follows: Combat Knife(stone) < Crowbar(iron) < Pipe Wrench(diamond). Wood/Gold swords are yet to be textured due to lack of idea. Maybe wooden stick..? YEAH, HIT THEM WITH FRIGGIN' STICK!! HAIL SCIENCE!!! I'm sure that the Golden Sword will be a Xenian weapon, though. Since Zombie Pigmen use them. Also, please note that, just like in Half-Life, in order to enter any ventilation shafts, you will have to crack open the vent access with your melee weapon, unless it was already opened by something (My point is that you shouldn't trash your crowbar, or any other gameplay-critical items).

We are also sharing a list of first six chapter's name with their progression meter next to it, just to keep you reminded. They are located at the end of the post, and can also be viewed at in the original post. Of course, chapter titles may change in the future. But the basic structure of the story will not change, since if we were to change something in the storyline that means we'll have to trash everything and start all over.

We've only revealed first six chapter's name as it is the first day of Isaac's adventure. Just like in the original Half-Life, time will change as you progress, but by means of command blocks instead of natural time progression of Minecraft. By the time you reach and completed sixth chapter, 12 hours in-game time would have already passed. (4-6 hours expected in real-time) Since the game starts roughly at 9 AM, it would be around 9 PM when you reach here.

More and more chapters name will be revealed once we reach at least 66.6% progress on that chapter, along with its short intro text.

Compared to Half-Life, our sixth chapter, Pest Control, takes place at the same time as Blast Pit from the original Half-Life, Crossfire from Decay, a long after the end of Blue Shift, and when Shephard was still unconscious at the very beginning of the Opposing Force.

Before we end the post, let's talk about the plan that we've mentioned earlier. It has something to do with the release date...

This place looks suspiciously clean...

No, not THE release date! We were actually considering to initiate episodic releases for our project, that is, release each chapter/part per months. Similar to the old 4-cuts comic in the newspaper with new episode for each day, rather than one entire comic book which would take a few months before completion. This is what Valve attempted to do with Half-Life 3, except that we all know how turned out. Episode 3

So, this way you won't need to wait until we finish everything, and most of all we won't make the same mistake valve made and just wait for new chapters to come out in a few months or so. And when we finish everything, we just glue everything together to make one giant map again and re-release it as the full version of the map.

This technique shall also help us fix bugs before we release full version, and get some feedback to improve next release. For example, we might include some gameplay elements that could be annoying to certain players, and continue to include these in the subsequential chapters. With the episodic release, we could hear feedback from you and improve it in the next version, and take care of the issue before gluing everything altogether.

There are some disadvantages too, of course. The biggest of them is that it will ruin or disrupt the continuous gameplay, forcing players to wait months to play next chapter/part (we have not decided whether we'll release part by part or chapter by chapter). This was what we felt when we played the first release of Black Mesa, although for Episode One this was a less prominent issue.

This is still in consideration, however. But as soon as we finalize this, we will inform you as fast as we can!

Note: The pictures are from the older version of this map, hence the title, postmortem.

I just played my 2 year old version of this map. On June 14th, 2013, I released the supposed demo version of the map, running on Minecraft 1.5.2. I saw what worked and what didn't. The map was, unlike how I remember, quite enjoyable. There were some flaws, exploits and bugs. But overall it was okay. It wasn't too bad, it wasn't too good.

Many story elements were different. For instance, in the old version Isaac wakes up when Gordon launches his rocket in chapter On A Rail, while in the current version is more consistent with original Half-Life, by making Isaac wake up nearly simultaneously with Gordon at the start of the Unforeseen Consequences.

I also saw many redstone mechanics that got depreciated in the current version of the map, even though they work excellent in my opinion. So I've decided to re-add some of these to the new map. People say that you can learn from yourself. I guess they're right.

Playing the map again, I also noticed how I added a working background music system back when the resource pack didn't support sound files. I used note blocks. Good old times. The newer /playsound command is somewhat broken... Mojang, please fix.

Final thoughts? The map feels really different from the current map... But at the same time it's set on the same setting so it feels similar too. Eh, what the hell am I saying? I'll go back making the map again. New Media Release very soon! (okay, not very. But soon.)

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"... Some people say, "How can you live without knowing?" I do not know what they mean. I always live without knowing. That is easy. How you get to know is what I want to know."

Today, we will re-visit some of the older creations I made. Mainly (and only) about that security checkpoint before you go to train station in the very first chapter.

Before you ask me, yes, I do save everything I make. Remember when I mentioned that the "map had seven complete chapters that could be played seamlessly for 6 straight hours"? I still have it! I simply never revisited them.

Okay. This is the very first incarnation of this level. Look at that straight lamps at the floor. And why is the glass giving me a finger? I have no idea. Only thing I remember is.. well.. No, I don't remember anything. It's been 3 years, people! Sorry!

Even if I had something to say, I wouldn't think it will be a good one. I mean what can you say about this picture? Hmmm? Movin' on.

The second version

This is the second version. Now it's a bit more colorful (The DEMO released before this, where everything was still stone.) Texture pack was being developed at this point. Notice the ores in the ceiling?

The ceiling texture was to be applied on the diamond ore. However later I changed to wool with the addition of carpets. I noticed the signs say null. Probably MCEdit error. Valve, please fix.

What can I say more.. There's an Enchantment Table. Players were to enchant their own weapons at their will. But this feature is dropped in the current version. Also notice the furnace. Same thing happend.

The third version

Third incarnation... I'm not sure. I thought it would work better than the second one. The building looks much more modern and detailed.

I still don't know... That yellow floor, and a tree in the middle of the room. Hmmm... The stairs leading up to elevators, I'll give that. I still have it in current version.

I'm so glad I decided to not go with this design. And so comes the fourth version.

The fourth version

The fourth and current version. We are not sure if this will be the final one, but probably will, since I don't like to keep on creating same thing over and over again. The purpose of this area is same as the first and every other version; a place you have to go through before getting to a train station.

Surely the map has changed its look over the years, but the principles stay. Floors still look dull so that's something I should do about. I hate to put lamps on floor, but I blame Minecraft's lighting. Mojang, please add light_spot. (Only nerds will get this joke.)

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"... Some people say, "How can you live without knowing?" I do not know what they mean. I always live without knowing. That is easy. How you get to know is what I want to know."

This means we've got seven new fancy screenshots for you to enjoy! Since, in a way, last weekend (26th to 27th) was the Apocalyptic Weekend of September. So I thought seven was a good number.

Born in Glendale, California, he'd often do nasty things and skip his school to go on a rampage with his comrades (like all Californians do), but he'd never do anything bad to his friends. As his mother always used to say, "... he's got a good heart.". He'd often make stupid decisions, but he'd never betray his lovely Armenian friends... and other non-Armenian friends, of course.

He'd listen to Steve Miller Band and Julian Lennon while playing some Space Invaders, building his evergrowing fear and anger to his math teacher. He'd often get F bombs at school, but he'd never give up on his burning passion on becoming an astronaut and subsequently becoming the first man to ever set foot on the Mars... which he failed miserably.

However, according to the uncertainty principle, something uncertain's bound to happen, and somehow he scored well on both Biology and Physics. "Huh. That's odd." he said, and so he became... well, a biophysicist. After he obtained a professorship at Caltech, he was looking for a way to burn down MIT, and next thing he knew was that he was already working at the Black Mesa Research Facility.

And we are here now, at the finest technological peak of the mankind, with crime rates skyrocketing outside, what will Isaac do? What can science do to improve the basic flaws of the human morality? Science has improved our lives, but are we happy living? Is this the life we've longed for? Pain and unlawfulness rule the globe, and we are not closer to answering the fundamental question of the universe.

I mean, what is a biophysics anyway? I mean physics is about... smashing stuff together. And biology is about the love between a man and his fine Cuban cigar. So what happens when one combines two together?

Back to the saneness, with the recent addition of shields, combat mechanic, new blocks and items, and a set of fancy new command blocks, a lot of contraptions have become more efficient. Not to mention how much it broke pre-existing mechanics, of course! Thanks Mojang, for making me redo every tellraw commands. It really helps me build this map fast!

Well, it's a new Media Release. I know it would've been better to post things in the weekends, but well, I think didn't want to lose the chance to mention the so-called great discovery NASA made thirty minutes ago. I really hoped they discover some aliens. But oh.

Also, a massive info time! (Last infoday was the Apocalyptic Weekend of 2014. That's more than a year ago. Wow, time flies fast!)

*The map is bigger; the map now weighs 512MB. Resource pack grew a lot and now it's about 80MB. Sound files take up more than half of pack. However the map should get lighter with me cutting off useless parts, and resource pack should get heavier since there are A LOT of models, and sounds yet to be worked on.

*Most of the textures in-game are now taken up and retextured to Half-Life ones. Notable exceptions are fire and water; they are hard to texture since they are animated. But I will take a look. This isn't a good news by the way; there are still tons and tons of Half-Life texture we really would like to add and implement to the map to make the map feel better. However there isn't enough blocks we can utilize. Mojang, add more blocks for us.

*Oh, and add more mobs too. That'd be great. You know what? Just keep add things. I mean there isn't even a crossbow in this game.

*Clouds are now available. Enjoy.

*Still yet to texture majority of the mobs. Sorry, I'm just lazy.

*Revamped the original post, since they broke it yet again...

*I'm trying my best to customize the models of the blocks. I hope I can.

*MASSIVE overhaul and optimization has been done. Although mostly courtesy of Mojang.

*When the map finishes and goes gold, I will probably archieve this thread and will create a new one.

*I probably mentioned this before, but the map uses some of the original soundtracks from Half-Life. However they are still in testing, since it's a bit buggy currently and it might never be implented.

*I'm rebuilding the entire map in a new map. This doesn't mean I've deleted everything and starting all over again. No, of course not! I've created a new empty map and simply moved all the previous structures to the new map. No harm done.

*Surface chapters are quite buggy now... I blame WorldPainter. They keep crashes and I can't work on. So they are currently suspended. Why did I choose to make this map in Minecraft in the first place? I should get back to Hammer.

*I've been using the cakes as the first-aid-kits, but not anymore. The map features working first-aid-kits now. Hooray.

*Foods became somewhat obsolete with the addition of working first-aid-kits, but they are still used in order to add the difficulty. In older, neglected parts of the facility where the kits are not available, foods you brought will be helpful.

*Speaking of the first-aid-kits, they can both be stored in the inventory for later uses, or there are also classic wall-mounted kits that will depreciate after a few uses.

*Laser Caution from Half-Life reappears. Enjoy.

*The early, pre-incident chapter will have optional interactions with your fellow villagers. For example, eating a breakfast along with your friend, or helping a guard get his doughnut, may earn you some items and respect that will come in handy later on.

*UHD Paintings (in Minecraft standard). One painting-block is 256*256 pixels large (normal blocks have 64*64 px; four times smaller!). This was done to improve visibility. To aid those with old hardware, (and, since Minecraft itself is low res game,) I will consider including a default resolution resource pack in 16px.

*Alright, I know Half-Life doesn't have shields in it (HEV? ... nope). But since they added one in the recent update I might consider using it. This doesn't mean that I'll be using everything Minecraft has to offer for me. Features that are unrelated to Half-Life (e.g. compass) remain unused in the map, unless I find something to justify.

*The very first chapter (train riding chapter) is shortened. Quality than quantity they say!

*Yet another changes on the history and profile of Black Mesa and Isaac Connor. I try to keep everything in harmony with Half-Life cannon, while deliberately changing some.

*Training chapters will probably get cut... Sorry guys. The map will not have randomized loots/chest contents anymore. I believe it's useless for a game like Half-Life. It was buggy anyway. Mob loots are still disabled. I hope you aren't mad at me...

*The chapter selection room is still there. You can skip to any chapters freely even without completing them (since there is no way to tell if you completed a chapter or not...). Ah, well, it doesn't really matter anyway. It probably won't make any sense to play the map from say, chapter 12.

*As you can notice from some of the medias we released, there are two HEVs you can wear. The red one (stronger) and the yellow one (the original, weaker one). Suits will have durability system inherited from Minecraft, which replaces suit batteries from the Half-Life. You cannot recharge the durabilities, however, you can find newer suits and abandon old ones.

*Also, unlike the original Half-Life, you will not have HEV suits from the start. Players will be able to steal one from the labs after the incident.

*In addition to the HEVs, I hope I mentioned that you can also wear security vests and PCVs. Sorry, but we are too lazy to make another map involving a security guard and a HECU soldier as a protag, so we did this.

With an estimated high of 105

*The sixth chapter, Pest Control, takes place in the Level 3 Dormitories. This is the same dormitories complex used by Gordon Freeman from Half-Life. Originally this chapter was added in because once I developed a texture for the beds and then realized that the beds appear only once in the game (in the very beginning at the Isaac's dorm).

*The very same Level 3 Dormitories appear in the game Half-Life: Decay, in the chapter Domestic Violence. The dormitories were being used as HECU checkpoints in Decay. Being about a few hours later, in Escalation, the dormitories will be re-infested with the aliens.

*Speaking of the crossover, obviously there are no direct crossovers. However, in the map you also visit (including the dorms) the Gamma Labs, and the Black Mesa Air Traffic Control, both of which also seen and visited in Decay. The areas are retconned; which means that they will not be an exact replica from the game. Some parts will be more faithful to the original, while others will divert a lot.

*In addition to this, in later, surface-themed chapters, players visit Black Mesa Hydro-Electric Dam, the iconic landmark of the Half-Life, visited in both the original game and the expansion pack Opposing Force. Our hero visits the dam some time after Gordon leaves and some time before Shephard comes. Fates are devil's playthings.

*Many characters from the original games such as Freeman or Rosenberg will also be mentioned. In the later parts of the map, players may hear about a rumor of a particular HECU soldier helping Black Mesa personnel.

Laser Caution

*The map is divided into two large parts. Each has about 8 chapters in it. To continue the spirit of Half-Life, the connection between the two parts is also seamless (Like transition between Apprehension and Residue Processing from Half-Life)

*Part One details the first day of the Black Mesa Incident, the Xenian invasion has just begun and the troops are coming to "rescue" you. This part of the map is relatively easy and similar to the first bit of the original Half-Life. It also is mostly puzzle based part, unlike later part which is mostly battle oriented. Mostly situated underground.

*Part Two is on the final day of the Black Mesa Incident, long after Gordon and Barney escaped the facility. The battle between the so-called 'remaining forces' is escalating. Xenians, X-Races, and the marines, including our dearest Adrian Shephard, are fighting for their inevitable deaths. Mostly situated on surface.

*Kinda ironic to say this in the very last, but, the map is still building at snail pace. It's going real slow. I'm talking about things like college submissions, of course. It's hard to get a decent job these days. Can't really concentrate on map making under these conditions. But I'm not stopping it. In fact if I did you won't be reading this, no?

*It's really rare to see one updating his own map after 2 years in a making. I mean most people just abandon it or sometimes they post a thread and no more updates are given. It's really strange that the map is unique in a way that it's one of those map still alive and making progress after all the harsh years. Hmm... This sounds familiar, doesnt it? I wonder what it could be...

Decay

Well, this concludes today's Media Release. Have a nice day, and see you in an undetermined time! Probably a very long time, again.

In the original version of the map, Isaac's DOB was stated to be September 14th 1962.
Later when the mod Black Mesa was announced to release on September 14th 2012, I pushed the date to September 17th 1963 (ironically, 50th birthday), to avoid confusion.
Later, Grand Theft Auto V was announced to release on September 17th 2013 (making it 50th birthday, again!) I pushed again to the current date, September 28th 1964.
Thanksfully, nothing happed on the faithful night of September 28th 2014, and here we are. I'm happy with the changes since numbers 9, and 64 is a power of a number (32, and 26 respectively), and 28 is a perfect number.
To think now, I think 27th would have been better becase it's 33 and it would have been Sunday today. Well, too late for that, I guess? OR IS IT.

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"... Some people say, "How can you live without knowing?" I do not know what they mean. I always live without knowing. That is easy. How you get to know is what I want to know."

So, yeah. It's been EXACTLY 30 years since the world's first temporal displacement took place on 1:20:00 AM, Wednesday October 26th, 1985, at the Lone Pine Mall parking lot, Hill Valley, California (beside the leap seconds and DST). Needless to say, the current time (as of writing this) is indeed 1:20:00 AM, October 26th, 2015 (Pacific Standard Time).

Yeah, you get the references: I hope everyone enjoyed their Back to the Future day! I celebrated it by re-watching all trilogy and playing the game too. And, obviously, putting this Media Release.

Anyway, here are three screenshots. Enjoy!

I actually wanted to put this up on the 21st since that's the date from the movie, but I was busy so I missed a chance. My friend said me that I should just forget it, but I didn't want to lose a chance to honour the trilogy.

BTTF is one of my favourite movie, and Half-Life is one of my favourite game, so therefore I thought I should at least do something for Half-Life on this date. Next up, do something for BTTF on the Half-Life anniversary, I guess? (It's been 15 years, 5 months and 10 days since the Black Mesa Incident.)

Talking about the screenshots; since I often only posts screenshots based on level design you might be wondering whether the map is in a playable state (that is, a map that is literally can be 'playable' from start to finish) or not. I assure you that the playable version of the map is indeed being worked on. In fact, allow me show you a gameplay screenshot right now...

As you can see, it's from the earlier portion of the map. Since we are nearly (95%) done with the early chapters, this will probably look similar to the final release version; although I cannot promise. I might make changes, or I might not. But right now, I like the way it looks.

Sadly we don't have any hoverboards or Mr. Fusion yet, but surprisingly we have drones and fingerprint recognition devices. They knew the future!!

So... Smell you later, I guess? Wow. Last time I posted Media Release I said that "it's going to be a very long silence". But looks like I broke it. That's the power of love.

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"... Some people say, "How can you live without knowing?" I do not know what they mean. I always live without knowing. That is easy. How you get to know is what I want to know."